Interesting New Info On Apple Music Service

I've started a new post (which mods can combine with others if they like) because specific new info is now coming to the fore. The following is from Mac Central.

Pui-Wing Tam reports for the Wall Street Journal that Steve Jobs' personal involvement has helped Apple's as-yet-unannounced music service secure rights to most of The Eagles' recordings.

The popular 70's rock band has been a holdout for other legitimate digital music services that have asked to include the band's catalog in their libraries. Irving Azoff, the Eagle's manager, said that he hasn't liked other online services, but he liked Apple's.

The article cites Apple's decision to move into the digital music publication business as a way for the company to grow its business despite faltering marketshare in the personal computer industry. The Journal suggests that Apple and Jobs have promised record executives that it will focus marketing efforts on getting out word about the new music service with an advertising campaign to rival its "Think Different" and "Switch" campaigns.

Reportedly, Apple's new service will be integrated with iTunes and will work solely with Macs, at least for now. Users will be charged $0.99 per song and $10 or so per album. The Journal article also sheds some light on the digital rights protection scheme Apple's service may use -- apparently, it will be more difficult to use iPods to transfer songs between computers, and users won't be able to e-mail or otherwise transfer songs to their friends' computers. The service will also allow legitimate users to play the songs on up to three Macs and an unlimited number of registered iPods, however.

The Journal also notes that Apple has also licensed the music of No Doubt -- another band that has been recalcitrant to see its works distributed electronically -- and other artists that haven't yet gone online. As a result, Apple's music service is to have an "Exclusives" area showcasing some of these unique artists.

Comments

Reportedly, Apple's new service will be integrated with iTunes and will work solely with Macs, at least for now. Users will be charged $0.99 per song and $10 or so per album. The Journal article also sheds some light on the digital rights protection scheme Apple's service may use -- apparently, it will be more difficult to use iPods to transfer songs between computers, and users won't be able to e-mail or otherwise transfer songs to their friends' computers. The service will also allow legitimate users to play the songs on up to three Macs and an unlimited number of registered iPods, however.

Sounds like... hm, sounds like the audio files will be locked "within" iTunes. A hidden or encrypted directory.

Individual songs or the whole album. Good show (but the margins on the albums are still rather large).

Multiple Macs, unlimited iPods. Goodo. Good for families and the previewed Rendezvous-enabled iTunes.

My biggest question is still: bandwidth, bandwidth, bandwidth! How will Apple handle customers on dial-up? What happens when a download fails? Et cetera.

The bad: Macs only first. I mean yay for us, but for this to work the other 95% needs access to this within 6 months.

Billboard is confirming much of what the WSJ has said. After 3 PM today (Friday the 25th) Premium users of Billboard's site will be getting more info. Perhaps someone on these boards subscribes or can post the info?

What do we think the chances are that 'any' distributor would be able to lease space on the service? I'm just curious because plenty of bands like The Dead, Phish, Pearl Jam, etc., offer shows and now whole tours for download. If Apple allowed band to lease space the cost of whole infrastructures could be avoided.

Sounds like... hm, sounds like the audio files will be locked "within" iTunes. A hidden or encrypted directory.

I think you're right. I wonder how many hours it will take after the service is released for someone to crack it.

But I wonder how you can use them on 3 Macs if "users won't be able to e-mail or otherwise transfer songs to their friends' computers." What's the difference between your friend's computers and your own 3 computers?

The "i" in iMac, iTunes, i____ was originally intended to stand for "internet."

While appropriate for iTunes (sort of), iPhoto, iBook, and iMac, the "i" has kind of lost its meaning when it comes to iMovie, iDVD (especially), and iPod. Those three products have had very little to do with the internet to this point.

The name "iMusic" would probably be the most appropriate name of any of Apple's services/products if the "i" is really supposed to reference the internet. A close second in line is iPhoto, and it's capability of ordering photo prints and books directly from your Mac.

Back to what I said earlier: What does iDVD have ANYTHING to do with the internet? Really?

The "i" in iMac, iTunes, i____ was originally intended to stand for "internet."

I think after the success of "iMac" and "iBook," Apple started to move to "i" as a way to distinguish their consumer products from the pro lines. (iMovie/Final Cut Pro, iDVD/DVD Studio Pro.) So the original meaning is sort of lost. That being said, I hope Apple comes up with a totally new name for the music service, along the lines of Safari (which we all recall was rumored to be named iBrowse ) or Keynote.

The "i" in iMac, iTunes, i____ was originally intended to stand for "internet."

While appropriate for iTunes (sort of), iPhoto, iBook, and iMac, the "i" has kind of lost its meaning when it comes to iMovie, iDVD (especially), and iPod. Those three products have had very little to do with the internet to this point.

The name "iMusic" would probably be the most appropriate name of any of Apple's services/products if the "i" is really supposed to reference the internet. A close second in line is iPhoto, and it's capability of ordering photo prints and books directly from your Mac.

Back to what I said earlier: What does iDVD have ANYTHING to do with the internet? Really?

In 1998, it was indeed intended to represent "Internet." Over time though, the "i" evolved into all things consumer.

was it metallica that put up a giant fuss and sued people over their music being distributed?

i'll be impressed when apple gets them

Metallica has nothing against online distribution, last I looked. What they want, as far as I've been able to discern from Lars' self-righteous huffing, are royalties. If Apple pays them royalties, and takes some measure to see that everything they offer doesn't end up all over KaZaA five minutes later, I don't really see what their complaint would be.

I'll bet that no small part of Steve's pitch is that the Apple service will make it so easy to find and purchase songs that consumers will prefer it to the unreliability, intrusiveness, and user-unfriendliness of most of the P2P services.

Quote:

i'll probably make a thread after it comes out, but who wants to take bets on how long before it gets cracked?

apple has never really done hardcore security stuff...think they will shine in this area?

Do they have to? When the iPod came out, Steve pointed out that it didn't have foolproof protection, and he didn't see the point in trying. As any honest security person will tell you, locks exist to keep honest people honest. As long as the security is enough to keep most people honest - or, looked at another way, as long as cracking and illicit distribution is kept to a dull roar - that's as much as can be asked of it, realistically. People trade security for convenience all the time.

I do think that iTunes Rendezvous implementation that was demonstrated - what was it, MWNY '02? - is definitely due. And what you're saying makes a lot of sense, because presumably streaming to another computer would be acceptable to the Record Labels whereas direct copying wouldn't.

But it still seems very different that being able to use it on 3 Macs. Does that mean you can only rendezvous with 3 Macs? If you have a fourth Mac networked in your home, you couldn't rendezvous with it? It sounds more like you'd be able to copy it twice after you purchase it, and then it locks out further copying.

I do think that iTunes Rendezvous implementation that was demonstrated - what was it, MWNY '02? - is definitely due. And what you're saying makes a lot of sense, because presumably streaming to another computer would be acceptable to the Record Labels whereas direct copying wouldn't.

But it still seems very different that being able to use it on 3 Macs. Does that mean you can only rendezvous with 3 Macs? If you have a fourth Mac networked in your home, you couldn't rendezvous with it? It sounds more like you'd be able to copy it twice after you purchase it, and then it locks out further copying.

I'm not sure how the security works, but Steve made a point in that demonstration that the song was not being copied. In other words, iTunes might be easily able to stream to more than three machines, at once or in total, but afterward there would still only be the one copy on the computer that did the streaming. So it has some (and I emphasize some) of the ability to share music, without the viral distribution aspect of P2P.

Perhaps something in the AAC file attempts to not be copied to another machine more than 3 times?